Remembrance Day
by AHGrayLensman
Summary: A short oneshot about finding hope in a postThird Impact world.


_Remembrance Day_

by AHGrayLensman

A short one-shot about finding hope in a post-Third-Impact world. Rated PG for mild profanity.

Disclaimer: Evangelion and associated characters are property of Gainax. Please don't sue me for borrowing a little.

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From the diary of Asuka Langley Sohryu: 

**17 May, 2024:**

Eight years.

Can you believe it? It's been eight years since Third Impact.

Eight years since those SEELE bastards took the entire human race right to the brink of destruction. Eight years since I had my butt handed to me on a silver platter by nine mass-produced Evas. Eight years since the fate of mankind was placed in the hands of a boneheaded teenage boy who was almost certain to screw things up, but somehow managed not to. Eight years since I woke up on that beach and told Shinji I felt sick.

And seven years since the start of our little ritual.

I have to admit, I thought it was a stupid idea at first, but I went along with it to humor Shinji. You see, he still gets depressed some times, especially around this time of year. I think part of his subconscious still blames himself for what happened. Intellectually, he understands that he did the best he could under the circumstances, but there's still this gnawing little doubt somewhere down deep, a small insistent voice that keeps telling him that maybe he could've done more. He's an idiot, of course... but he's **my** idiot, and I wouldn't have him any other way.

Sorry, I'm letting myself get sidetracked.

On the first anniversary of Third Impact, Shinji said he wanted to go down to the shore of the LCL sea and have a remembrance vigil for his mother, Misato, and Rei. He'd been really depressed for at least a week before that -- enough that it was starting to worry me -- so I went along with it in spite of my misgivings, on the condition that we remember my mother as well.

Mother... I still have a hard time talking about her, even with Shinji. Thanks to Third Impact, he knows a little more about her than I would like sometimes. He says he envies the fact that I had my mother as long as I did. (For my part, I envy the fact that he never had cause to fear his mother; I, on the other hand, still have nightmares about that.)

Anyway, we went down to the beach, near where Shinji and I first woke up after it was all over. He lit three candles: one for his mother, one for Misato, and one for Rei. I lit another for my mother. Then we just sat there for a while, watching those four candles burn. I know it sounds stupid, but there was something very powerful about that simple act of lighting a candle to remember someone. Both Shinji and I were crying by the time they burned out, and crying is not a luxury I allow myself very often.

Shinji was in much better spirits after that, and I thought that would be the end of it. Boy, was I wrong.

The next year, Shinji wanted to do it again, and having seen how it had improved his mood before, I agreed. When we got to the beach, there were a bunch of ex-NERV people waiting there, including a few I recognized like Dr. Ibuki and Commander Fuyutsuki. Shinji swears up and down that he never mentioned it to anybody, and I **know** I didn't mention it to anyone, so who knows how they all found out about it... but they did. It ended up being almost like a family reunion -- a really, really dysfunctional family union, but a family reunion nonetheless.

By the third anniversary, the crowds were getting big enough that the general public found out about it. Then on the fourth anniversary, something amazing happened -- somebody came back from the LCL, right in front of their family and friends. It wasn't anybody in particular, and it wasn't unheard-of for people to come back after that long... but it gave people hope, which can be a powerful thing sometimes. Especially after something as horrible as Third Impact.

Last year, the Japanese government finally bowed to public pressure and declared the 17th of May a national day of remembrance for those lost in Third Impact. I hear the US and EU plan to follow suit in a year or two.

This year's Remembrance Day is especially bittersweet for Shinji and I. We're getting ready to move to the US for a couple years; I have a two-year post-doctoral fellowship with the bio-physics group at MIT, and Shinji has a teaching gig at the Berklee School of Music. As a result, we probably won't be in Japan for Remembrance Day for at least the next two years. That bothers Shinji quite a bit. He's been missing Rei a lot lately, and I can't help but feel a little bit jealous about that. I know that his relationship with her was nothing like it is with me, but it's a little hard some times to hear him talk about another woman so much. Still, I want her to come back too, if for no other reason than to tell her how sorry I am for some of the things I said to and about her eight years ago.

And maybe, just maybe Rei will find it in her heart to forgive me. I can only hope.

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AUTHOR'S NOTES: The idea for this just sort of hit me a few nights ago, shortly after I finished the draft of the last chapter of "Understanding". I guess in a way, this is an epilogue to that story, but it's sufficiently detached that I think it can stand on its own. 


End file.
